Creating WordPress Users Without WP Admin Access

Many times your new clients provide you with FTP access to their server but not with WP Admin access. Other times they give you wp-admin login but with “author” or “editor” credentials that doesn’t give you access to much stuff. You can’t get that .xml export file, you can’t modify the theme or add plugins, etc. And on a few occasions, their webmasters purposely avoid giving their clients admin access to make your life more difficult. So what you need is to be able to create an admin user through FTP. It’s possible! Here’s how to do it:

1. Go to the theme’s folder, download and open functions.php in your code editor.

path: /wp-content/themes/customtheme/functions.php

2. All the way to the bottom of functions.php add this line of code:

wp_insert_user(array('user_pass' => 'password_here', 'user_login' => 'username_here', 'role' => 'administrator'));

Change “passord_here” and “username_here” with your desired user name and passwords respectively.

3. Save and upload functions.php to your client’s server.

Your are all set! You should be able to log in to WordPress with your new admin login.